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The pandemic, although disastrous for most parts of the economy, had one minor upside: a boost in online viewing. The number of subscribers of Portugal’s VOD platform Filmin, for example, has tripled compared with last year, due in part to the lockdown. “We grew as much in three months as we forecast for two years,” Filmin Portugal manager Anette Dujisin told Variety. Classic films have played a major part in driving that growth.

Despite challenges with local classics, Filmin is seeing growing success with heritage films and catalog titles as well as new releases. Filmin has received constant requests from subscribers – even loud demands from some – for more classic films since the service went online in 2016, Dujisin said.

The feedback affirms “that a VOD platform dedicated to independent cinema is not complete without a certain body of classical films,” Dujisin said. “So since the beginning we have been making...

2019 Foreign Language Film Oscar Submissions Algeria – Until The End Of Time – Yasmine Chouikh Argentina– The Angel (El Angel) – Luis Ortega Austria – The Waldheim Waltz – Ruth Beckermann Belarus – Crystal Swan – Darya Zhuk Belgium – Girl – Lukas Dhont Bolivia – Muralla – Rodrigo Patiño Bosnia – Never Leave Me – Aida Begic Brazil – The Great Mystical Circus – Carlos Diegues Bulgaria – Omnipresent – Ilian Djevelekov Cambodia – Graves Without A Name – Rithy Pan Canada – Watch Dog – Sophie Dupuis Chile – And Suddenly The Dawn – Silvio Caiozzi Colombia– Birds of Passage, Cristina Gallego & Ciro Guerra Croatia – The Eighth Commissioner – Ivan Salaj Czech Republic – Winter Flies – Olmo Omerzu Denmark – The Guilty – Gustav Möller Dominican Republic – Cocote – Nelson Carlo de los Santos Ecuador – A Son Of Man – Jamaicanoproblem and Pablo Agüero Egypt – Yomeddine – Abu Bakr Shawky Estonia – Take It Or Leave It – Liina Trishkina-Vanhatalo Finland – Euthanizer – Teemu Nikin France – Memoir Of War – Emmanuel Finkiel Georgia – Namme – Zaza Khalvashi Germany – Never Look Away – Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck...

Despite producing only around 15 feature films per year, Portuguese cinema has consistently won significant festival prizes.

In 2018, awards for Portuguese films included Cannes’ Critics’ Week winner, “Diamantino” by Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt, and “The Dead and the Others” by João Salaviza and Renée Nader Messora, which took a Special Jury Prize at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard.

Portuguese filmmakers have survived through a mixture of dedication, creative ingenuity and co-productions. Amid economic crisis, in 2012, the situation seemed dire, with Portugal’s National Film and Audiovisual Institute (Ica) unable to open any funding lines.

However a 2012 film law, revised in 2014, provided new revenues for the Ica by introducing levies on subscription TV services. As a result, the Ica has been able to channel significant additional funding into the domestic industry, including new support programs for TV series and animation features.

Investment obligations for domestic broadcasters have also been upped including reinforced commitments for public broadcaster,...

First-time submissions come from Malawi and Niger as Austrlia and New Zealand join the list.

Eighty-seven countries have submitted films for this year’s foreign language film Oscar, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has revealed - a drop from the record 92 that submitted last year.

Countries submitting films in the category for the first time include Malawi - which has entered Shemu Joyah’s The Road to Sunrise - and Niger, whose submission is Rahmatou Keïta’s The Wedding Ring.

Submissions that had not previously been confirmed include Australian entry Jirga, from director Benjamin Gilmour, and New Zealand contender Yellow Is Forbidden,...

First-time submissions come from Malawi and Niger as Austrlia and New Zealand join the list.

Eighty-seven countries have submitted films for this year’s foreign language film Oscar, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has revealed, a drop from the record 92 that submitted last year.

Countries submitting films in the category for the first time include Malawi, which has entered Shemu Joyah’s The Road to Sunrise, and Niger, whose submission is Rahmatou Keïta’s The Wedding Ring.

Submissions that had not previously been confirmed include Australian entry Jirga, from director Benjamin Gilmour, and New Zealand contender Yellow Is Forbidden,...

First-time submissions come from Malawi and Niger as Austrlia and New Zealand join the list.

Eighty-seven countries have submitted films for this year’s foreign language film Oscar, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has revealed, a drop from the record 92 that submitted last year.

Countries submitting films in the category for the first time include Malawi, which has entered Shemu Joyah’s The Road to Sunrise, and Niger, whose submission is Rahmatou Keïta’s The Wedding Ring.

Submissions that had not previously been confirmed include Australian entry Jirga, from director Benjamin Gilmour, and New Zealand contender Yellow Is Forbidden,...

Eighty-seven countries have submitted films for consideration in the foreign language category for the 91st Academy Awards.

Oscar nominations will be announced on Jan. 22 and the ceremony will be held on Feb. 24 at Los Angeles’ Dolby Theatre. Malawi and Niger are first-time entrants. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences made the announcement on Monday.

High-profile titles include Alfonso Cuaron’s “Roma,” the Mexican entry; Denmark’s “The Guilty”; Germany’s “Never Look Away,” from previous Oscar winner Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck; Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Shoplifters,” the Japanese entry that won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival; Nadine Labaki’s “Capernaum,” the Cannes jury prize winner from Lebanon; and Pawel Pawlikowski’s “Cold War,” the Cannes best director prize winner from Poland.

The 2018 submissions are:

Afghanistan, “Rona Azim’s Mother,” Jamshid Mahmoudi, director;

Algeria, “Until the End of Time,” Yasmine Chouikh, director;

Argentina, “El Ángel,...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced the official list of submissions for the 2019 Oscar for best foreign language film. There are 87 countries vying for the prize this awards season, including first-time entrants Malawi and Niger. Included among the titles are high-profile contenders such as Mexico’s “Roma” and Poland’s “Cold War,” both of which are vying to break out of the foreign race and earn nominations for best picture, best director, and more.

Nominations for the 91st Academy Awards will be announced on Tuesday, January 22, 2019. The 91st Oscars will be held on Sunday, February 24, 2019. Click here to view predictions for the foreign language Oscar race from IndieWire’s awards editor Anne Thompson.

2018 Foreign Oscar Submissions

Afghanistan, “Rona Azim’s Mother,” Jamshid Mahmoudi, director

Algeria, “Until the End of Time,” Yasmine Chouikh, director

Argentina, “El Ángel,” Luis Ortega, director

Armenia, “Spitak,” Alexander Kott, director

Australia, “Jirga,...

Argentina has selected Luis Ortega’s well-received Cannes Film Festival crime drama The Angel (El Angel) as its contender for the Foreign Language Oscar. The film, produced by Pedro Almodóvar, broke box office records in its home country; The Orchard acquired U.S. rights after its Un Certain Regard bow and has set a November 9 theatrical release in New York and Los Angeles for the film before rolling it out nationally.

The pic from Ortega, who directed and co-wrote with Sergio Olguin and Rodolfo Palacios, is a portrait based on Argentina’s real-life serial killer dubbed “The Angel of Death.” The pic picks up the story when Carlitos (Lorenzo Ferro), a 17-year-old with movie star swagger, blond curls and a baby face in 1970s Buenos Aires, meets Ramon (Chino Darín) who embark on a journey of discovery, love and murder. When he is finally caught, the press dubs Carlitos “The...

Italy has chosen Matteo Garrone’s well-received Cannes drama Dogman as its Foreign Language Oscar hopeful.

Marcello Fonte stars as Marcello, a gentle dog groomer who finds himself involved in a dangerous relationship with Simone (Edoardo Pesce), a former violent boxer who terrorizes the entire neighbourhood. In an effort to reaffirm his dignity, Marcello must submit to an unexpected act of vengeance. Fonte won the Best Actor prize at Cannes.

Garrone’s Archimede produced alongside Rai Cinema’s Paolo Del Brocco, Le Pacte’s Jean Labadie, and Recorded Picture Company’s Jeremy Thomas. Magnolia has U.S. rights. Garrone’s previous credits include Gomorrah, Reality and Tale Of Tales, all of which played at Cannes.

Italy has been the most successful country in the Academy’s Foreign Language category, scoring 14 wins and 31 nominations. The country’s last nomination and win in the category came in 2013 with Paolo Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty.

Poland has chosen Pawel Pawlikowski’s Cannes-winning black and white drama Cold War as its Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film.

The well-reviewed story of a fated Polish love affair set across Europe during the late 1950s and early 1960s, is among the favorites for the prize. It is Pawlikowski’s first film since 2014 pic Ida, which won the Foreign Language Oscar. Amazon will release stateside on Dec. 21.

“Cold War — artistically fulfilled, universal story of impossible love, inscribed in the turbulent history of 20th century Poland,” the Polish Oscar Committee stated in a press release. “Pawel Pawlikowski’s film captivates with its performance, excellent acting and unique use of Polish folk music motifs. The previous successes of the film on the international arena will certainly help in further promotional activities.”

Also entering the fray this week are Dante Lam’s blockbuster Operation Red Sea for Hong Kong, Rima Das’s Village Rockstars for India,...

Screen’s regularly updated list of foreign language Oscar submissions.

Nominations for the 91st Academy Awards are not until Tuesday January 22, but the first submissions for best foreign-language film are now being announced.

Last year saw a record 92 submissions for the award, which were narrowed down to a shortlist of nine. This was cut to five nominees, with Sebastián Lelio’s transgender drama A Fantastic Woman ultimately taking home the gold statue.

Screen’s interview with Mark Johnson, chair of the Academy’s foreign-language film committee, explains the shortlisting process from submission to voting.

Submitted films must be released theatrically...

Nicolas Winding Refn, Karim Ainouz and Lu Chuan are among the directors of projects selected for the inaugural Crouching Tigers Project Lab at the 1st International Film Festival & Awards Macao (Iffam).

The new lab, which takes place December 9-11, will present 12 projects, separated into genre, auteur and projects from partner organisations (see full list below).

Selected filmmakers will be able to interact with potential funders and distributors, as well as participate in script consultations, a pitch forum and workshops. The 12 projects will also vie for three cash awards of $20,000, to be presented by Fox International Productions, and one award of $10,000 each from Ivanhoe Pictures and China’s Huace Media.

The lab has been structured around three concepts:

*Innovative perspectives on the integration of Asian and non-Asian elements in film script and production.

*A special focus on genre cinema, including both its classic forms and contemporary trends originated by new technologies and formats.

*Effective networking...

This article was produced as part of the Locarno Critics Academy, a workshop for aspiring journalists at the Locarno Film Festival, a collaboration between the Locarno Film Festival, IndieWire and the Film Society of Lincoln Center with the support of Film Comment and the Swiss Alliance of Film Journalists.

Audiences at the 2016 Locarno Film Festival got used to hearing a familiar statement: “I just saw a Portuguese film.” They were hard to ignore. Fourteen films of some 200 in the lineup were directed or produced by Portuguese people and were distributed across different sections of the festivals. Viewed together, they have a lot to say about the state of a country’s cinema and its ability to wrestle with broad historical concerns.

These included the so-called “blasphemous” biopic of a Lisbon patron saint in João Pedro Rodrigues’ “The Ornithologist” and “Correspondences,” directed by Rita Azevedo Gomes, which focuses on a letter...

Name and focus changes for every section, which are now all competitive, resulting in the festival’s structure being “slimmer’.

The ninth Rome Film Festival (Oct 16-25) has revealed a diverse line-up including the Italian premieres for potential awards contenders including David Fincher’s Gone Girl. the world premiere of Takashi Miike’s As the Gods Will and Burhan Qurbani’s We are Young, We are Strong and European premiere of Oren Moverman’s Time Out of Mind, Toronto hit Still Alice and Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.

This year for the first time the award-winners in each section of the programme will be decided by the audience on the basis of votes cast after the screenings.

Each section has changed name and focus for 2014 and are all competitive, resulting in the festival’s structure being “slimmer’.

Italian comedies Soap Opera and Andiamo a Quel Paese bookend the line-up.

Full line-up

Cinema D’Oggi

World premiere

• Angely...

“My name is Joaquim, and my life has nothing special.”

This is how the film begins, and the film is what makes (among other things) Joaquim Pinto special.

A notebook, a diary. A tale of pains and joys, of suffering and struggling. Of books and films. Of many places and moves. Of memories and images that come again and again. A tale of bodies, cells, and the making of mankind.

Almost 20 years ago, Joaquim Pinto has been diagnosed with AIDS. After having gone through all available treatments, he has entered an experimental program with a Spanish specialist.

From November 2011 on, Joaquim has been making a film: the notebook of one year of tests and treatment, of limited activity. But also a year of going through one’s memories, a year to study and think, a year to live with Nuno, his life partner and husband, to live with the neighbors and the friends,...

Above: Juan Gatti’s original Spanish poster for Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Pedro Almodóvar, Spain).

After covering the posters for the very first and the current New York Film Festivals, I thought it might be fitting, in this last year of Richard Peña’s tenure as Program Director and Selection Committee Chairman of the festival, to gather all the posters from Peña’s very first Nyff, 24 years ago.

In the current edition of Film Comment—an essential souvenir of the history of the festival to date, complete with a list of every feature film to have played the festival in its 50 years—Gavin Smith writes that “The 25-film lineup of the 1988 Nyff was partly a reflection of the decade’s drift and uncertainty—two came from Nyff veterans (Sergei Paradjanov, Marcel Ophuls), two were post-Glasnost rediscoveries (Andrei Konchalovsky, Larissa Shepitko), and nine were bets that didn...

In 2009, the best film in Competition at the Berlinale was Maren Ade's Everyone Else (Fwiw, it came away with 1.5 Silver Bears, the 1 for Best Actress Birgit Minichmayr, the .5 for tying with Adrián Biniez's Gigante for the Jury Grand Prix; the Golden Bear that year went to Claudia Llosa's The Milk of Sorrow). Three years on (!), the trio that made Everyone Else worth talking up to this day (see, for example, Kevin B Lee's new video essay on a key scene at Fandor; see, too, Mike D'Angelo on the same scene a year ago at the Av Club) is back in Competition, albeit in three different films. Lars Eidinger has drawn the shortest straw, taking on the lead in Hans-Christian Schmid's rather dismal Home for the Weekend. Minichmayr's fared better opposite Jürgen Vogel in Matthias Glasner's new film, though I seriously doubt many of us will...